All Things Are Contracts

Chapter 75: A Peaceful Night

While Zhanyue closed his eyes to refine, Baizhi wasn’t idle either. She took out her bronze furnace and a dagger. First, she removed the dagger’s sheath and handle, placing only the metal blade part into the bronze furnace. Then she brought out the poison collected earlier from the fifth-grade spirit beasts. Both the giant toad and centipede were terrifying poisonous creatures, with extremely frightening venom on their bodies. Neither was something a Star Profound expert could easily handle.

She sealed the furnace lid, not letting a trace of poison gas escape, then began tempering with poison. The two little cats were scared and hid far away, naturally aware of how terrible those poisons were.

Soon after, the originally green and black poisons became transparent, while the originally bright silver blade turned an eerie green color. All the toxins had been refined into it by Baizhi. This basic poison-tempering artifact refining technique had some commonalities with pill refining, so it wasn’t difficult for Baizhi.

Baizhi took out a pair of thick gloves, put them on, then reassembled the dagger, revealing a vicious smile. She thought that just scratching an opponent’s skin a little with this blade would be enough to make them suffer.

“What are you doing, smiling so sinisterly?” Zhanyue, having finished refining, asked the grinning Baizhi curiously.

Baizhi waved the poisoned dagger, “This thing is extremely toxic. It could easily take down a fourth-grade spirit beast, and even fifth-grade spirit beasts would fear it.”

“Uh, I thought you were a harmless little white rabbit. Indeed, a woman’s heart is the most poisonous,” Zhanyue joked.

Baizhi glared fiercely at Zhanyue, “You’d better know it. If you dare to misbehave, I’ll…” Baizhi made a couple of gestures with the dagger.

Zhanyue looked at her pretty face, now without the veil, and smacked his lips, “What a pity. I should have acted earlier. Now that you have the power to resist, it’s going to be troublesome.”

Baizhi’s face reddened. She knew Zhanyue was joking, having long gotten used to his personality. “Enough of that. How are you? What innate divine ability did you comprehend?”

Zhanyue smiled slightly and replied, “Naturally, it’s that bear’s talent, Soul-Shaking Roar. It’s a rare soul-targeting attack method.”

Baizhi remembered how that night, with just one beast roar from the black bear, her spirit had wilted significantly. This talent was indeed excellent.

“Now that you’ve learned Charm Shadow and have this extremely poisonous dagger, you finally have some self-protection ability. I can feel more at ease. Tomorrow, let’s go deeper,” Zhanyue said, a weight finally lifting from his heart.

“No rush. Can we stay here for a day tomorrow? I want to attempt breaking through to fifth-grade alchemist. Fifth-grade pills are much more powerful than fourth-grade ones. I still have some materials for fifth-grade pills. With these pills, our journey will be safer,” Baizhi suggested. After refining the talent patterns on that beast core, her soul power had greatly improved, reaching the Profound Being level. Only her physical body and foundation couldn’t keep up, but entering the Profound Realm was just a matter of time. Of course, Baizhi naturally wouldn’t choose to enter the Profound Realm now.

“Fifth-grade alchemist… tsk tsk,” Zhanyue envied. “Alright then, we’ll stay here for a day tomorrow.” If anyone else had said they could refine fifth-grade pills within a day after their soul power reached the standard, Zhanyue would have dismissed it as nonsense. But if it was Baizhi saying it, Zhanyue didn’t doubt it at all.

Zhanyue gathered the two little cats into his arms, then took out a fourth-grade spirit beast core and gave it to the little white cat, and a fifth-grade spirit beast core to the little black cat. Zhanyue had tried refining beast cores before; they had a very low cost-performance ratio, with limited help for human cultivation. They were generally used for pill refining or artifact refining, but for spirit beasts, they were great nourishment.

“Let’s keep this sixth-grade beast core for now. We’ll give it to them when they’re stronger. After all, it’s their mother’s power. That old cat demon would probably want her power to be inherited by them,” Zhanyue put away the sixth-grade beast core. The two little cats couldn’t refine a sixth-grade beast core yet.

Night fell, with the blood moon high in the sky. As expected, the two little cats didn’t change, their eyes still clear. The two little ones were both hugging their respective beast cores and cultivating.

“I wonder what bloodline they actually have, not being affected like other beasts,” Zhanyue smiled, then said, “Let’s call this little white cat Xue’er (Snow), and this little black cat Mo’er (Ink).” Zhanyue simply named the two little cats. Today’s gains were quite substantial, putting Zhanyue in a great mood.

He started a fire and took out some fish. The fish were already dead, but the spatial ring isolated air, having a preservation effect. He immediately began grilling the fish. The two little ones had been hungry all day, and smelling the aroma, they stopped cultivating and waited eagerly by the fire.

Handing the grilled fish to Baizhi, and two smaller ones to the two little cats, watching them eat happily, Zhanyue felt a sense of peace in his heart. “Three little greedy cats.” Although the two little cats looked harmless now, Zhanyue knew how terrifying they would be when grown up. That cat demon’s sixth-grade transformation was quite shocking. Then he picked up the last grilled fish and began eating.

“You should rest well, keep your spirits up. Try to succeed in one go tomorrow,” Zhanyue took out a piece of beast hide, laying down a temporary bed for Baizhi, while he sat near the cave entrance. The secret realm wasn’t safe; they couldn’t both sleep at the same time. However, with their strength, going without sleep for a few days wasn’t a problem.

Baizhi lay down, still hugging the two little cats, looking at Zhanyue’s back as he sat cross-legged cultivating. She revealed a sweet smile. In all the time since she ran away from home, only when she was by Zhanyue’s side did she feel completely at ease.

“Good night.”

Perhaps because they had killed all the powerful spirit beasts nearby during the day, the night passed peacefully. When the sun rose again, Zhanyue opened his eyes.

“Spirit Communication Realm, eighth stage now. The spirit energy in this secret realm is dense. It’s really a good place for cultivation, pity we can only stay for a year,” Zhanyue said, looking at his improved realm. He had also taken quite a few spirit fruits and pills during this time.

“You’re really a monster. You’re only at the Spirit Communication Realm, yet your strength is so great,” Baizhi, who had already woken up, complained. Then she took out various medicinal materials and her alchemy furnace, beginning her first attempt at refining a fifth-grade pill – the Fierce Profound Pill, an advanced version of the fourth-grade Fierce Explosion Pill, and currently the most helpful powerful attack pill for them.

Outside the secret realm, several Ghost Shark clan members gathered, discussing recent events.

“According to our spies inside, another trial ground has been discovered in there, seemingly called the Red Lotus Trial. The strongest of those youngsters have already entered the third level of the trial, but we don’t know what kind of treasures they can bring back,” one Ghost Shark clan member said.

“That guy called Feng Bulang is quite interesting. Wonder how many levels he can pass. It seems the rewards are completely different depending on the order of completion,” another said.

“I’m just a bit worried. If they get spatial rings or similar treasures from the secret realm and take our treasures out, wouldn’t we suffer a great loss?” a Ghost Shark clan member worried.

Another joked, “You’re really treating the secret realm as your own property? These two secret realms are originally exclusive treasures for humans, otherwise other races wouldn’t be unable to enter. Besides, those above Profound Realm can’t enter the Azure Sky Secret Realm. Even if they got spatial rings, how much could they take away? Do they have the strength to enter the depths of the secret realm? According to our intelligence, in the deepest parts, sixth-grade beings are everywhere, seventh-grade are as common as dogs, and there might even be eighth-grade demon emperors.”

The person nodded, “Indeed, I overthought it. Even if someone had the devil’s luck and got a spatial ring, at most they’d only take away some garbage from the outskirts. We just need to wait for our clan’s formation grandmaster to break the restrictions of these two secret realms, then we can go in and get our hands on the truly valuable treasures.”

“It’s difficult, so difficult. Even the elders in our clan don’t know who created these two secret realms. They only know that the formations are profound, far surpassing the level of those formation grandmasters recorded by humans,” another sighed.